Questions & Answers about Han hade inget alibi i fjol.
Why do we use i fjol to say last year in this sentence?
I fjol is a very common fixed phrase in Swedish that specifically means last year. You can also use förra året, which means exactly the same thing, but i fjol is shorter and frequently used in both everyday speech and writing.
Does the i in i fjol follow a rule for time expressions?
Yes! In Swedish, the preposition i is often combined with time words to talk about a specific time in the past. Just like i fjol means last year, you will see this pattern in phrases like i morse for this morning or i julas for last Christmas.
Why is the word for no written as inget instead of ingen here?
The word for no or not any must match the gender of the noun it describes. Because alibi is an ett word (ett alibi), you must use the neuter form, which is inget. If it were an en word, you would use ingen.
How would the sentence look if I wanted to emphasize i fjol by putting it at the beginning?
If you start the sentence with the time expression I fjol, the verb must take the second position. The sentence would become I fjol hade han inget alibi. This swapping of the subject and verb is a great reminder of the Swedish V2 rule.